I recently completed my 33rd revolution around the sun. I don’t celebrate my birthdays. It seems silly to me to celebrate the anniversary of something so arbitrary. Of course we make a huge deal of our children’s birthdays. They don’t seem to mind that it’s arbitrary and my wife just rolls her eyes whenever I mention it.

I met my wife in the traditional way (for people of my generation) — in person. At work, actually. And we dated for about seven years. Neither of us even had an email address during the early years of our courtship. That isn’t true of many young people today. And I find it unlikely in the extreme that technology won’t play a major factor in my children’s dating. I wouldn’t be surprised if they met their future spouses online or through some kind of wireless gadget. Probably, my kids will have just as many online friends or more than real-life friends. Robert Paterson has some interesting things to say on the subject. This will affect all of us who are raising children today in significant ways which we can only begin to imagine. How will I react if my son or daughter want to marry someone they’ve never met in person? What can I do about online bullying? Already I can see a need to dole out computer access in a similar way to how my parents used to grudgingly give me the car keys.

With people waiting to have children, I may not have grandchildren until I’m well into my 60’s. That doesn’t seem too bad right now. Actually, the prospect of a decade-long break from children sounds pretty good at the moment. But I’m sure I’ll feel differently when my oldest is in her late twenties. Who knows if I’ll even be around to meet my great-grandchildren.

Hopefully, they’ll have figured out a cure to that whole “death” thing by then.

Comments

1. Gene Wise on 2005-03-15 17:34:11 wrote: I was 56 when my first grandchild came and that was fine. When he was 10 I could run faster and throw harder than he could. Problem though when my last one game at age 78 and I can’t even pick him and his car seat up and walk in a straight line to the car - what will I do when HE’s 10? And how about the great grandkids in my 80’s?